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Old March 9th, 2006, 03:33 PM posted to rec.boats,alt.fishing,rec.outdoors.fishing
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Default California sturgeon fishing will never be the same.


"Terry Lomax" wrote in message

Regarding the water shortage issue, hasn't California gotten a good
amount of rain in recent months? Is any of it helping water flows in
the rivers (which would obviously help the fish), or is all the water
being stolen by irrigation and refilling reservoirs that are still way
below their proper levels? I know paleface farmers and ranchers steal
nearly 100% of the water from the Klamath and other streams.


Water shortages in the west are a very complex issue. "Stolen by farmers"
is really not a valid comment. The farmers in the southwest produce a huge
percentage of the food consumed by the entire country in the winter months.
Is there another way? Well I have been in north central Ohio too where they
have hundred and hundreds of acres under glass for winter crops. Simpley
put, its much more economical to raise crops in the desert.

As to actual water usage. I don't know how much of that really goes to
farmers (by percentage) , but in my area the farmers have been using less
and less water to grow the same amount and in many cases more crops. There
has been such a dramatic improvement in irrigation techniques that
controlled flows on the river have been very noticeably reduced in the last
several years. This is release on demand flows based on irrigation demands
downriver.

All that being said, I wonder how the people would survive in a drought like
we have had for the last several years if there was no water storage and no
flow control. Historically desert peoples have been wiped out by drought in
the past.

Hmmm.... I wonder how the fish would have survived with the Colorado River
just barely trickling around the pebbles in the bottom of the channel?

You might argue that without our controlled surpus systems we wouldn't have
so many people living here in the first place. That is a valid arguement,
but the people are here now. They aren't going to leave. From Los Angelos
to Phoenix and all points in between the farms and the populations are
dependent on stored water. Blow up the dams and you would have to relocate
50 (apx) million people. That is just in the west. If you are going to get
rid of the dams in the west then you have to get rid of the dams in the rest
of the world too. And as long as you are at it all the leviys too. Now
think about all the displaced people you would have to accomodate. It would
make the refugees from Katrina look like normal vacation season travel. .

The preceeding post is just to make you think about the larger implications.
An arguement, that "I don't care about all those people, just what affects
what I want," won't work either. It doesn't work because the displacement
of that many people would have worldwide negative impact on everything and
everybody.

--
Bob La Londe
http://www.YumaBassMan.com